Sunday, September 20, 2009

I am not conscious of the scars,most of the time. I do not seethem readily, am not reminded;both are toward the back of the skull,one a little higher thanthe other, hidden by my hair.

I still have my hair, thank God.

The one is from a gun. No, nota bullet, a gun. The higher-up,older mark that would be,and came not from true malicebut a small automatic thrownin anger as I walked away.

It didn't go off, thank God again.

I know that's not very exciting.There is no tale of a fightnor holdup, just some mild amusementin visualizing a pissed (and drunken)woman chucking her pearl-handedpurse gun at my back. I suppose

she could have shot me. Thank God once more.

I did bleed some. As I didwhen I got whacked with a steel bar.That would be the second scarand, yes, that was malice, not anger,intended to lay me out. It didn't.The bar only glanced across the backof my skull and laid open the scalp.

For which I also am thankful to God.

Anyway, those marks remain,reminders of who I was and stillam, perhaps. Not a fighter,not a tough guy, just someonewho's been some places and done some thingsand just might again, some day.

Though laid out in lines of rough tetrameter, this could just as readily have been formatted as a prose poem. Or prose, period. Very first draft-y, of course, as is most anything I post here, and more of an idea than a finished piece.